


Sentinel

by JazzRaft



Category: Final Fantasy XIII, Final Fantasy XIII Series, Final Fantasy XIII-2
Genre: M/M, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-14
Updated: 2017-03-14
Packaged: 2018-10-05 06:48:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10300112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JazzRaft/pseuds/JazzRaft
Summary: “Hey, Noel?” he said into the silence, feeling separate from the words. “If… if I do die today, can you promise me that you’ll find a way to finish the new Cocoon?”“No promise necessary, because you’re not going to die today.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on [tumblr](http://jazzraft.tumblr.com/post/157152144232/14-with-noel-and-hope-big-eyes-pretty-please) for #14 in [this prompt post.](http://jazzraft.tumblr.com/post/156511645930/send-me-a-pairing-and-a-number-and-ill-write-you)

Hope woke with the startling impression that someone was in his room. It took him a full minute, staring bug-eyed at the ceiling in a cold sweat, too scared to move lest the intruder knew he was awake, before Hope remembered that it was just Noel.

The hunter resumed snoring, and Hope realized that the only reason he’d assumed something was wrong was because the snoring had ceased. In the few days since Noel had appointed himself Hope’s personal bodyguard, Hope had grown to interpret his snoring as a signal that all was well. Oddly enough, it actually lulled him to sleep rather than kept him awake. If it was safe enough for Noel to sleep, then it was safe enough for Hope to sleep.

Nevertheless, the scientist found it difficult to resume his slumber after awakening. He sat up in bed and rubbed the sand out of his eyes, blinking at the dim room. The back of the couch was facing him, but he found the shape of Noel’s boots slung over the arm. Hope glanced at the digital clock on the nightstand: 5:34 AM. He still had little over half an hour before the alarm was supposed to wake him.

Might as well get an early start, he thought to himself. The groan of the mattress as he climbed out of bed was enough to make Noel snort and bolt upright. He was the lightest sleeper Hope had ever met – and he’d camped on Gran Pulse with Lightning. Harrowing, that, but when Noel woke at attention, he at least had the courtesy to read the room before fisting a weapon and aiming it at nothing.

“Mornin’,” Noel yawned, itching his head where his hair was a wild tangle of brown spears.

“Hey.”

Hope shuffled towards the kitchenette and straight to the coffee pot, quietly preparing a fresh brew while the fatigue of sleep finished rolling out of Noel in a series of halting yawns.

“A little early for you, isn’t it?” Noel asked as he noted the time, rubbing the bleariness from his eyes.

“Not by much.”

Hope shrugged. He didn’t feel as though his paranoia was a topic that warranted further discussion. He’d been on edge, unable to forget Snow’s warning since his departure. Hope’s heart had frozen over in fear and hadn’t thawed since. He did his best to stay brave, constantly repeated Lightning’s lessons in his head as he left the suite every morning, fearful that this alleged assassin could be around any corner.

_Let doubt take over, and despair will cripple you._

Besides his old partner’s advice, he had Noel to help ease any of his doubts. The hunter was sharp-eyed and quick to action, faithfully following in Hope’s shadow ever since Serah and Snow had left. While not the most imposing of bodyguards, what with his lop-sided grin and slight slouch, loping gait and out-going exterior, more than once he’d proven just how lethal he was prepared to be should anyone dare to come at Hope with so much as a paper-clip.

Hope leaned against the counter while he waited for the coffee pot to grind, meeting Noel’s eye from across the room. He sat with his legs apart, elbows set on his thighs and draping his arms between his knees. He gave Hope a cursory glance, assessing his state of well-being and nodding to himself when he gave it a passing grade. Then, he proceeded to search out the windows from his perch on the couch, taking his time to analyze the murky dawn in lieu of anything else to do.

“If you want to wash up or something, I think I’ll be fine for the two feet between here and the bathroom,” Hope offered, nodding at said room’s doorway.

“Probably. Still, today’s not the day to get sloppy.”

Hope turned back to the coffee pot, lest his face betray his fear. Three days, Snow had said. Three days and Hope would be assassinated, unless they could change the future. Today was day three. Snow and Serah had yet to return. It wasn’t that Hope didn’t have faith in his friends to succeed in their quest. Or that he mistrusted Noel’s skill to keep him safe in the event that they didn’t.

Death was the last unknown. And there was so much more Hope wanted to learn before letting it teach him. Especially if there was a way to reverse it.

“Oh, um, sorry,” Noel murmured from behind him. “I shouldn’t have brought it up…”

“No point in avoiding it, right?”

Hope clamped his mouth shut when he could hear the words trembling a little bit, and prayed that Noel hadn’t noticed. The coffee pot stopped grinding and Hope poured them each a cup. Noel’s eyes instantly brightened as he set the mug into his waiting grasp. His favorite thing about the past was the quantity of coffee. Not a luxury he could indulge within the wasteland of his future.

Hope set himself on the edge of the couch while Noel took a big gulp, as if it wasn’t blazing hot and perfectly capable of boiling his tongue if he wasn’t careful. Hope vaguely wondered if the roughness of the hunter’s diet had toughened his tongue to the point of numbness – in which case, he wondered if Noel could even taste. He must have, if the contented sigh that rustled out of him was any indicator.

“Okay, we _really_ have to save the future if it means coffee is in the cards,” he joked, his laugh coming out a little more forced than he probably intended.

He was trying to lighten the mood after bringing Hope’s down, but Hope could barely lift a smile onto his face in an effort to indulge him. Noel glanced guiltily into the galactic swirl of cream and coffee in his cup, fingers drumming around the ceramic.

They each stared at different spots around the room for a long moment after that, Noel constantly downing scalding coffee just to have something to do while Hope’s chilled, untouched, between his hands.

“Hey, Noel?” he said into the silence, feeling separate from the words. “If… if I do die today, can you promise me that you’ll find a way to finish the new Cocoon?”

“No promise necessary, because you’re not going to die today.”

He said it with such a spiteful certainty that Hope really wanted to believe him. But the cold feeling of dread bleeding through him couldn’t be warmed by the heat of Noel’s conviction. Every minute that slipped past, he imagined an ominous shadow drawing closer and closer to his back. It made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end, beads of sweat break out on his forehead, and his hands shake around the coffee mug until Noel’s clutched around them.

“Hey, I’m with you, okay? Always.”

His gaze was steely in the pre-dawn gloom, two icy blades wielded against the inevitability of death. Hope felt confident that the hunter could fight absolutely anything when he stared at him with that intensity. Before Noel drew back and blinked, surprised by how impassioned his own words were.

“I-I mean… for as long as you need me to hang around.”

He ducked his head and rubbed the back of his neck. Hope just barely caught a splash of pink fall across his tanned cheeks before he did. Hope bit the inside of his cheek to keep himself from smiling, charmed by the contrast of Noel’s iron-clad determination with his humility. For the tiniest, flicker of a moment, it allowed Hope to forget about his fears.

Tentatively, Hope reached over to take his hand again. It made him feel secure in a way he hadn’t felt since being on his own as the Academy leader. Even if the overwhelmingly practical part of Hope’s brain insisted that he had every reason to be afraid, there was something illogically assuring about Noel that could convince him not to be.

“Even if we do survive today, I think I’d like it if you always hung around.”

Noel grinned, instantly emboldened by Hope’s confidence in him. “Try not to regret those words when you do survive. ‘Cause you’re gonna get real sick of me afterwards.”


End file.
